Media - Finalised Flashcards
How is New Media revolutionary?
How does convergence revolutionise new media according to Neophiliacs?
Outline your answer in:
- Point
- Explanation
- Evidence
- Link
✩ Neophiliacs argue that the convergence that new media provides increases consumer choice.
✩ There are now hundreds of entertainment and news channels on television that can be accessed by anyone.
✩ For example, a person can choose to listen to music by playing it on a computer or mobile phone.
✩ Pluralist neophiliacs argue that this competition between this diversity of media will improve the quality of media output, thus revolutionising media.
How can this be criticised according to Marxists?
✩ Increased consumer choice creates false needs & upholds capitalist consumerist society.
✩ Thus new media has not been revolutionary as it has given more power to the bourgeoisie to impose over the proletariat.
How does new media lead to more involvement through interactivity in democracy and political processes according to Neophiliacs?
✩ It provides people with the opportunity to access a wide range of information and alternative interpretations and viewpoints unlikely to be found in the conventional mainstream media that have set the agenda for debate in wider society.
✩ Argues that internet can help revitalise democracy as it gives a voice to those who would otherwise go unheard. It allows like-minded people to join together and take action, leading to social change.
✩ Drawing support for causes such as the #Me Too Movement on Twitter.
How can new media having increased interactivity be criticised?
✩ Increased participation does not necessarily guarantee equal representation.
✩ Social media groups who are marginalised by society e.g. old people may still face barriers to entering new media such as not being able to use computers. This is called the digital divide.
✩ Therefore, limiting the realisation of a democratic and inclusive participatory space, where the audience is free to express their opinions and views.
What do Cultural Pessimists argue that the new media provides in criticism of neophiliac view regarding increased consumer choice?
✩ Increased choice of media delivery systems has led to a decline in the quality of popular culture.
✩ For example, while digital television has increased the number of channels for viewers to choose from, this has led to a dumbing down of popular culture as television companies fill these with cheap imported material such as sport and reality television show.
✩ BBC experienced a process of ‘tabloidization’ because they had to compete with Sky and other TV channels. This resulted in a decline in documentaries and news coverage and an increase in reality television programmes.
Not-so-new Media: Cultural Pessimists
✩ ‘Old’ technology such as television and telephone landlines are still integral to the use of new media such as computer game consoles, and broadband and wireless connections to the internet.
✩ They suggest that interactivity is not something new because people have been writing to newspapers and phoned in to media agencies such as TV channels for years.
How is their ‘not-so-new’ media point countered by Neophiliacs?
✩ Nonetheless, our interactivity is much better than before.
✩ This is because we can talk about things give feedback and even participate as an audience through citizen journalism.
✩ For example, we can openly criticise what people are saying in the media through gathering our evidence in forms of video recordings.
✩ This means we can actively get involved with new media compared to the past limited ways of interacting.
Quality of information; how has it decreased according to cultural pessimists?
✩ Question the quality of information being spread by many media outlets. Keen refers to the internet as the cult of amateur and argues that this is leading to the demise of quality information.
✩ Teachers held concerns about their students using the internet as a research tool due to inaccurate information.
✩ For example, Wikipedia was named as an unreliable source as the content on this website is user-generated so users have a window of opportunity to publish inaccurate information
How is ‘cult of amateur’ criticised in terms of audience being active rather than passive?
✩ Sociologists challenge the notion of an audience that passively absorbs inaccurate information.
✩ It is increasingly recognized that audiences do not blindly accept media messages; rather, they engage with news content more critically and with a heightened awareness of potential bias.
How has new media affected audience participation?
Globalisation of new media has allowed for increased audience participation…
How so? Perhaps link this to a sociologist, how it allows for increased participation and provide an example…
✩ McLuhan argues that the world is rapidly becoming a global village in which rapid technological change has caused space and time barriers in human communication to collapse.
✩ People around the world can communicate instantaneously on a global scale.
✩ For example, we can zoom or face time to communicate with people all over the world.
How has media negatively affected audience participation according to Marxists?
✩ New media has negatively affected audience participation
✩ Marxist view - Capitalism oppresses the proletariat and mass media communicates capitalist ideology around the globe.
✩ Mass media now spreads common mass cultural ideas across the globe, to keep the proletariat under false class consciousness.
How has new media affected gender stereotypes?
New media has provided a platform for marginalised voices to be heard and has helped break down traditional gender roles.
Elaborate upon this point…
✩ Young people are seeing different representations of both genders.
✩ Stay at home dads, ‘New Man’.
✩ Women —-> Careers/Ambitions. E.g. Women in stem.
✩ Men doing makeup.
✩ Less judgement and stigma in society due to changing norms and values.
✩ More confidence.
How can this be criticised in terms of the generation divide?
Provide an example…
✩ Generational divide: Different generational groups may have different views.
E.g. Older people say women should stay at the home, younger people say women should go to work and provide for their family.
How has new media positively affected gender stereotypes according to Green and Singleton?
Provide an example…
✩ Green and Singleton argue that in new media, especially in the sense of digital technology, women are most empowered. Feminists have used new media to challenge symbolic annihilation.
✩ For example, campaigns like #WomenWhoInspire exemplify the impact of spotlighting positive role models. This hashtag encourages users to share stories of women who have made noteworthy contributions across diverse fields such as arts and science.
✩ The campaign creates a collective narrative that challenges prevailing stereotypes.
✩ Therefore, showing how new media has allowed for women who have been historically underrepresented to be clearly shown, providing an inclusive space where women’s achievements can be represented equally.
How can this be criticised through the idea of online spaces having echo chambers…?
✩ (An echo chamber is an environment where a person only encounters information or opinions that reflect and reinforce their own)
✩ Online spaces can actually create an echo chamber in which like-minded individuals reinforce their existing beliefs about alternative gender roles.
✩ There may be one also reinforcing traditional gender roles.
Evaluate the view that the media only reflects the news of a powerful minority
Point 1: Instrumental Marxists
What is their viewpoint on how the media reflects the news of a powerful minority?
✩ Class inequality is reproduced and justified.
✩ Media is an ideological state apparatus, used to transmit a conservative, conformist ideology in the form of news and entertainment.
✩ Media owners can push certain narratives in the media thus shaping and motivating how people think about the world they live in
Can you provide an example of how this narrative in the media is pushed?
vHall (1970s) Moral panic over muggings committed by black youth. It was just a scapegoat to distract from the failure of capitalism. A blame on race rather than inflation.
Criticism of Instrumental Marxist view in terms of active/passive audience approaches…
✩ Contemporary sociologists challenge the notion of an audience that passively absorbs the dominant ideology.
✩ It is increasingly recognized that audiences do not blindly accept media messages; rather, they engage with news content more critically and with a heightened awareness of potential bias.
Point 2: Hegemonic Marxist Approach
What is their viewpoint on how the media reflects the news of a powerful minority?
✩ Media content supports the interests of the media owners as broadcasters tend to be overwhelmingly White, middle-class and male.
What do journalists/broadcasters believe in and how does this affect how the news obviously reflects the powerful minority view?
Provide an example…
✩ These journalists and broadcasters tend to believe in ‘middle-of-the-road’ consensus views & ideas, which are unthreatening and believe to appeal to many of their viewers and readers, who they think are also middle-class and educated.
✩ This means anyone who believes in ideas outside of this media ‘consensuses are viewed as ‘extremist’ and not invited to contribute their opinions in media. Also, alternative views are often ridiculed by journalists.
✩ As a result of this journalistic consensus, the media filter which issues should be discussed by society, and which should be avoided. This is called agenda setting.
✩ For example, rather than talking about issues such as the rise in Islamophobia, which are of utmost significance or the waiting times of the NHS being far too long they would rather talk sports such as football which are in the interest of the audience, and generate viewership.
How do feminists criticise or offer an alternative perspective to the Hegemonic Marxists?
✩ Feminists would argue that it fails to take into consideration the patriarchal values that the media imposes upon its viewers.
✩ The media is owned largely and controlled by men and agenda-setting is a patriarchal exercise that serves to limit women’s role in media production and content.
Point 3: Pluralists
What is their viewpoint on how the media reflects the news of the demands of the public?
✩ They see the media as democratic as everyone is given a platform to express their views.
✩ Many believe mass media is essential as most people gain knowledge about politics from newspapers, television and the internet.
Can you fully outline their view in regards to how media corporations have to meet the demands of their audience?
Please provide an example, and outline how about their view of owner’s being able to control content.
✩ Pluralists argue the readers, viewers & listeners are the real power holders as they have the choice to buy or not to buy —> Freedom of choice.
✩ This causes competition between different media companies; the best company is the one who has tailored to their audience, giving them power.
✩ They have to tailor their products to appeal to certain social groups to avoid business failure.
✩ E.g. this is seen in the failure of the BlackBerry, they didn’t update their features to appeal to the young.
✩ The market determines media content and product, not the owner.
✩ Pluralists argue that the diversity of media products worldwide makes it impossible for the owner to control their content.
How do Marxists counter the Pluralist perspective?
✩ Marxists counter this by arguing that the audience’s ‘choice’ is an illusion, with the media manipulating consumer desires through advertising and creating false needs. For example, teasing the content of the next day’s paper.
Point 4: Post-Modernists
What is their viewpoint on how the media cannot reflect the news of only the minority?
✩ Today, it is impossible for owners or editors to control the media
✩ The extent of choice that people have over the media they wish to consume has become greater.
Could you tell me about how we as the audience have power, using key terms like media saturation and hyper reality?
✩ Audience has the freedom to choose which media they consume.
✩ For example, people can use social media platforms to put across their own narratives.
✩ Media saturation; people are exposed to media messages all the time, so it is impossible to limit and control.
✩ Media saturation has become so increasingly prevalent we cannot distinguish between real life and the media version of real life called hyperreality.
✩ Can easily reject any hegemonic messages from the powerful and create their own narratives instead.
How can the concept of media saturation and hyper reality be criticised in terms of who has the true power?
✩ Media saturation gives more power to owners and journalists. If people cannot distinguish between reality and a media construct, then that suggests that a great deal of power on the part of those who have power within the media.
Is what happens in the news an accurate reflection of social reality?
What does McQuail argue about news as an accurate reflection of social reality?
Key terms to include: Gatekeepers, social construct, filtered, news values.
✩ McQuail argues that news is a socially manufactured product because it is the result of a selective process.
✩ Gatekeepers, such as editors and journalists and media owners make choices and judgements about what events are important enough to cover and how to cover them. This makes the news a social construct.
✩ Things that they don’t want to the audience to know are gate kept/filtered. Things they want the audience to know are already set on their agenda as high priority.
✩ This causes media companies to follow a set of news values which allow them to decide which stories to focus on and which ones to ignore (Extreme and not mainstream) as the media is used as an ideological state apparatus.
How do news values reflect whether stories are published in the news or not?
Provide an example of a news value…
✩ Stories are much more likely to be pursued and published if they meet news values.
✩ An example of a news value is…
✩ Continuity (Continue familiar news e.g. Boris Johnson Partygate Scandal)
✩ Once an event has become headline news it remains in the media spotlight for some time - even if its amplitude has been greatly reduced - because it has become familiar and easier to interpret.
✩ Continuing coverage also acts to justify the attention an event attracted in the first place.
How would Marxists criticise the concept of news values and whether it reflects social reality or not?
✩ Marxists argue that the News Values are selected to represent the ruling class ideology
✩ The coverage of foreign affairs and natural affairs is precisely selected by the bourgeoisie.
✩ This diverts the proletariat from the real issues happening at home such as the living crisis.
✩ This deliberate distraction keeps the proletariat under the false class consciousness because they become unaware of true issue at hand because they are being exploited by the bourgeoisie.
✩ By directing attention away from immediate, tangible issues at home, the ruling class can perpetuate the idea of this sense of normalcy and prevent the proletariat from rebelling against the ruling class.
✩ Thus the news does not reflect social reality, but rather distracts from it.
What is citizen journalism and how does it show whether the news reflects social reality or not?
Please provide an example to support your point and explanation…
✩ The collection, dissemination, and analysis of news and information by the general public, especially by means of the internet
✩ Postmodernists such as Drudge claims that citizen journalism allows every citizen to be a reporter
✩ Not constrained by any system of news values that might prevent certain facts from coming to life
✩ For example, the BBC was accused of not reporting knowledge of Jimmy Saville’s crimes because he occupied a powerful position within the BBC.
✩ Improves the democratic process and overcomes these obstacles
✩ Therefore, it challenges the idea that news is shaped by news values and supports the postmodern notion that mass media is now characterised by diversity.
How is the concept of Citizen Journalism criticised by what is required from citizen journalism?
✩ However, this is criticised Gilmor points out citizen journalism is often the product of a narrow and privileged part of society because it requires education, technical skills, money and time.
✩ It is, therefore, doubtful that traditional voiceless sections of society the poor and powerless are going to be citizen journalists due to this digital divide.
What is a moral panic, and why does it show whether the news is a reflection of social reality or not?
Provide an example.
✩ A moral panic is an over exaggeration from the news that makes something bigger than it is, to produce a reaction from society.
✩ This idea says that sensationalist reporting by the newspapers distorts the act of the crime or deviance by making it worse than it actually is and increases public awareness.
✩ For example, Cohen studied how the media has demonised youth culture. This happened to Mods and Rockers in 1964, who were seen as modern-day folk devils who threatened social order.
✩ His research had found that actual acts of deviance were minimal however public pressure was put upon the courts to act, leading to many members of these gangs to be arrested and jailed.
How can the concept of Moral Panics be criticised?
✩ McRobbie and Thorton argue that new media has radically changed the relationship between the media and their audience and as a result undermined the overall impact of moral panics.
✩ Audiences are now allegedly more sophisticated in how they interpret news stories.
✩ Competition between different types of news media means that audiences are now exposed to a wider set of news interpretations about social problems and are thus more likely to be sceptical of their moral panic status
Outline and explain two ways in which the new media may be creating a global popular culture. [10 marks]
What do Post-modernists argue about the globalisation and popular culture? (specifically hyperreality)
Provide an example to support this view, and ensure that you remember to outline the sociologist associated with hyperreality.
✩ Postmodernists regard the diversity of the globalised media as offering the world’s population more choices in terms of their consumption patterns and lifestyles, opening up a greater global awareness and access to a diversity of cultures.
✩ Baudrillard believes that we now live in a media-saturated society where images now dominate and distort the way we see the world.
✩ This distorted view of the world has led to people being unable to distinguish between media and real life. This distorted view of the world is referred to as hyperreality. This means that we now identify more with media images than our own everyday experiences and thus live a media-lead virtual life.
✩ For example, we are now more likely to get excited about acts on a reality TV show or engage with in conversations with practically strangers over Facebook and Twitter, rather than get involved in the local community.
Now how does this affect the global popular culture?
✩ As a result, the media can create perfect and idealist images which outperform the real thing, leaving the audience feeling depressed because their life can never match up to the onscreen projection.
✩ Therefore, the effect of globalisation on popular culture is that it has led to people being unable to distinguish between media and real life.
How would Marxists give an alternative view point about globalisation and popular culture?
✩ However, Marxists would argue that global popular control acts as a form of social control.
✩ It gives the illusion of choice, but it really is only a choice between similar dumbed-down, trivial entertainment which maintains the ideological hegemony and power of the ruling class.
✩ This is because consumers are lulled into an undemanding, uncritical passivity and mindless social conformity, making them less likely to challenge the dominant ideas.
What is McDonaldization, how does it relate to media and how has it affected globalisation and our popular culture?
✩ Ritzer came up with a term called McDonaldization. This refers to how the media has become just like fast-food places, such as McDonald’s, who have an efficiency driven approach that’s the quick and the same everywhere.
✩ In media, McDonaldization means making things quick and streamlined. TV shows, movies, and news often follow the same formats and styles to appeal to a lot of people worldwide. This is demonstrated in how certain genres and predictable stories have become popular, and information gets spread fast.
✩ Therefore, the effects of globalisation on consumption of popular media are that it has been dumbed down to adapt to the audience’s undermined ability to think critically and their reduced attention spans.
Can you provide an example of how McDonaldization works in media?
✩ A good example of this in media is the use of short sound bites. These are brief and easy-to-understand pieces of information, such as 30 seconds shorts on YouTube. They’re efficient and grab attention fast, but the downside is that sometimes they make complex issues seem too simple.
✩ This speedy way of sharing information can make it tough for people to get the full picture of what’s really going on in the world.
✩ So, McDonaldization in media is making things fast and efficient, but it might mean we miss out on the details and complexity.
How can this be criticised through audiences now being aware?
✩ The concept might be challenged on the grounds that it assumes a universal appeal for standardized content.
✩ Critics argue that audiences are not passive consumers and can actively seek diverse and unconventional media, challenging the notion that McDonaldization completely dictates cultural preferences
How was globalisation affected the relationship between the media and their audiences?
How has globalisation created a global village?
Outline theory and the sociologist associated with it..
✩ McLuhan argues that the world is rapidly becoming a global village in which rapid technological change has caused space and time barriers in human communication to collapse.
✩ People around the world can communicate instantaneously on a global scale. For example, we can zoom or face time to communicate with people all over the world.
✩ In addition to this, we are able to have idealised Western ideas spread around the world about having a car, marriage and a house through the media.
Is ‘global village’ actually a bad thing? –> Marxists would say..
✩ Is ‘global village’ actually a bad thing?
✩ Marxist view - Capitalism oppresses the proletariat and mass media communicates capitalist ideology around the globe.
✩ Mass media now spreads common mass cultural ideas across the globe, to keep the proletariat under false class consciousness.
Who is Ritzer, what does he argue about how a global culture is created?
Can you provide an example of this in real life?
✩ Ritzer argues that companies and brands now operate on a global scale, promoting a global culture along with the consumerist lifestyle associated with them, thereby weakening local cultures.
✩ As a result, companies use the transnational media to promote their products on a global stage and to make their logos global brands.
✩ For example, globally recognised logo’s such as Apple, Nike and Google are known across the world in both Western and non-Western countries.
Cultural Homogenisation refers to the idea that different cultures transform and become similar to each other as globalisation progresses.
How is this Ritzer’s previous view supported by Sklair and what he calls ‘culture ideology of consumerism’?
Provide an example of to support the notion that Western media is becoming popular.
✩ This is further supported by Sklair, who argued that media is largely American based, spreading news information and popular culture to a global market.
✩ This encourages the acceptance of the dominant ideology as Sklair calls ‘culture ideology of consumerism’. This means there is a shared western culture around the world of watching the same tv shows, films, music and fashion, thus sharing the same Westernised lifestyle.
✩ For example, Breaking Bad (an American Netflix show) is one of the most showed on the Netflix platform around the world.
✩ Therefore, with American companies such as Netflix dominating the streaming of television and film shows, it is apparent Western media is becoming popular around the world and is becoming more important than local media.
How does Tomlinson, a post-modernist, criticise this view through cultural hybridisation?
✩ Tomlinson argues that globalisation does not involve a direct cultural imposition from the Western world, but instead there is a hybridisation of cultures whereby individuals can ‘pick and mix’ and draw upon their own local culture as well as Western/global culture.
✩ Therefore, globalisation has allowed for an increased choice promoting different cultural styles around the world and helps for hybrid cultures.
What is McDonaldization, how does it relate to media and how has it affected globalisation and our popular culture?
✩ Ritzer came up with a term called McDonaldization. This refers to how the media has become just like fast-food places, such as McDonald’s, who have an efficiency driven approach that’s the quick and the same everywhere.
✩ In media, McDonaldization means making things quick and streamlined. TV shows, movies, and news often follow the same formats and styles to appeal to a lot of people worldwide. This is demonstrated in how certain genres and predictable stories have become popular, and information gets spread fast.
✩ Therefore, the effects of globalisation on consumption of popular media are that it has been dumbed down to adapt to the audience’s undermined ability to think critically and their reduced attention spans.
Can you provide an example of how McDonaldization works in media?
✩ A good example of this in media is the use of short sound bites. These are brief and easy-to-understand pieces of information, such as 30 seconds shorts on YouTube. They’re efficient and grab attention fast, but the downside is that sometimes they make complex issues seem too simple.
✩ This speedy way of sharing information can make it tough for people to get the full picture of what’s really going on in the world.
✩ So, McDonaldization in media is making things fast and efficient, but it might mean we miss out on the details and complexity.
How can this be criticised through audiences now being aware?
✩ The concept might be challenged on the grounds that it assumes a universal appeal for standardized content.
✩ Critics argue that audiences are not passive consumers and can actively seek diverse and unconventional media, challenging the notion that McDonaldization completely dictates cultural preferences
How is femininity represented in media?
What is symbolic annihilation?
✩ Tuchman et al. (1978) used the term symbolic annihilation to describe the way in which women’s achievements are often not reported or are condemned or trivialised by the mass media.
✩ Often their achievements are presented as less important than their looks and sex appeal.
What did Duncan and Messner find that supported the existence of symbolic annihilation?
Why is this significant..?
✩ Duncan and Messner’s research (2002) into television sport presentation shows that what little coverage of women’s sport there is tends to sexualise, trivialise and devalue women’s sporting accomplishments.
✩ For example, different language is used by commentators (who are men) to talk about female athletes describing women in sports as girls while males in sports are rarely referred to as boys.
✩ This is significant as this is a clear example of how language choices create a double standard, where women’s achievements are often downplayed or sexualized compared to their male counterparts.
Actually, what have Green and Singleton found about representations of women in new media and how it positively presents women?
Provide an example of how this is the case, and how this has allowed for empowerment of woman.
✩ Green and Singleton argue that in new media, especially in the sense of digital technology, women are most empowered. Feminists have used new media to challenge symbolic annihilation.
✩ For example, campaigns like #WomenWhoInspire exemplify the impact of spotlighting positive role models. This hashtag encourages users to share stories of women who have made noteworthy contributions across diverse fields such as arts and science.
✩ The campaign not only celebrates individual achievements but also creates a collective narrative that challenges prevailing stereotypes.
✩ Therefore, showing how new media has allowed for women who have been historically underrepresented to be clearly shown, providing an inclusive space where women’s achievements can be represented equally.
Key-term test!
What is a cult of femininity?
✩ Promotes a traditional ideal where excellence is achieved through caring for others, the family, marriage and appearance.
Research on women’s magazines indicates that they reinforce patriarchal ideals and women’s subordinate position to men.
What is Ferguson’s main argument?
✩ According to Ferguson, women’s magazines revolve around a cult of femininity emphasising traditional values of caring for others, family, marriage, and appearance.
What did Ferguson find in her research, and how does this contribute to woman’s portrayal in media?
✩ Evidence to support this comes from a content analysis of teenage magazines in Britain indicating that there is a heavy focus on beauty and fashion (70% of content), with minimal attention given to education or careers (12% of content). Orbach argues that this emphasis on slimness and beauty in these magazines perpetuates the idea that slimness equals success in life. She accuses the media of encouraging young girls and women to be unhappy with their bodies.
✩ As a result, she argues that this may contribute to the development of eating disorder by constantly pushing women to be concerned with their weight, shape size and looks. For instance, advertisements promoting dieting may act as stressors, prompting women to constantly compare themselves to the size-zero supermodels portrayed in the media. This is significant because recent research has shown that eating order rates have doubled from the years 2000 to 2018.
✩ Therefore, traditional media representations, perpetuating stereotypes of femininity centred around a predefined ideal of beauty, may lead to unrealistic portrayals of women, leading to low self-esteem among female viewers regarding their own bodies.
How is Ferguson’s view challenged?
Hint: Think in terms of modern women magazines.
✩ However, Winship challenges Ferguson’s view, arguing that women’s magazines provide a wider range of options for women and address important issues like domestic violence and child abuse.
✩ This more nuanced view suggests that these publications can be platforms for meaningful discussions and empowerment, challenging the idea that they only reinforce traditional gender norms.
How is masculinity represented in media?
What is the ‘metrosexual male’?
✩ A type of masculinity that was focused on appearance and fashion and which championed masculine values as caring and generous. The metrosexual male was thought to be in touch with his feminine side, useful around the home and considerate towards his female partner but still maintain their heterosexuality.
What does Easthope argue about representations of men in media?
What term was coined for this new type of masculinity?
Hint: Past media representations of men vs newer forms of media representations of men.
✩ Easthope argues that media, including Hollywood films and computer games, promote the idea that masculinity based on strength, aggression, competition, and violence is biologically determined and a natural goal for boys.
✩ However, in the 1980s, glossy magazines like Maxim emerged targeting middle-class young men. These magazines suggested that men should be emotionally vulnerable and in touch with their emotions or feminine side and the magazines advocated for treating women as equals and caring more about appearance. This new type of masculinity was called the “new man” by commentators.
What did Post-modernists speculate to explain this shift in masculinity
How did this new type of masculinity ‘_____’ lead to the development of a metrosexual male?
You might as well explain again what a metrosexual male is…
✩ Post-modern sociologists speculated that this shift in masculinity was influenced by the increasing economic independence and assertiveness of women.
✩ As a result, media representations of the “new man” introduced the concept of the metrosexual male.
✩ The metrosexual male refers to men who focused on appearance, fashion, and championed caring and generous masculine values. The metrosexual male was depicted as being in touch with his feminine side, helpful around the home, and considerate towards his female partner.
What does Gauntlett and Rutherford argue about media representations of men, and could you explain the concept of ‘retributive masculinity’?
✩ However, Gauntlett argues that there are still plenty of magazines aimed at men which sexually objectify women and stress images of men as traditionally masculine.
✩ Rutherford suggests that these magazines are symbolic of what he calls retributive masculinity – an attempt to reassert traditional masculine authority by celebrating traditionally male concerns in their content, i.e. ‘birds, booze and football’.
